In radio technology, the transmission of data via electromagnetic waves, i.e., apparently through the medium of air (over the air, or OTA), is also referred to as the air interface. Such an air interface is in particular distinguished in that no solid-body transmission medium, such as copper cable or glass fiber cable, is used, which for the purposes of the following statements does not exclude transmission in a vacuum. Telecommunications approaches that make use of such a transmission are known as, for example, over-the-air programming (OTA), over-the-air service provisioning (OTASP), over-the-air provisioning (OTAP), or over-the-air parameter administration (OTAPA).
The named technologies are of particular importance for the updating of so-called firmware, i.e., software embedded in electronic devices. Modifications adapted to firmware of the above-named OTA technologies are referred to collectively in telecommunications under the general concept of “firmware over-the-air programming” (FOTA).
German Patent Application No. DE 10105454 A1 describes a method for the automatic updating of software via an air interface that is used to update software running on a system with new software modules, these software modules first being tested and application modules then being derived from these software modules.